We respectfully request that you do not cry out "I Have Made Fire!" when switching on your "Olde Brooklyn Lantern"

There is so much to love in this advertisement for a product which may or may not be from the people who brought us the Amazing Electric Quaker Heaters Not Actually Made By Quakers.

There is the look of utter astonishment on the old people when the lights suddenly go out- they act like a tribe of superstitious savages experiencing a total eclipse for the first time.  "Light Gone! Where Go Sun?" 

Consider that this couple appears to be of the generation which grew up during the Great Depression, survived World War II, and raised children under the shadow of the Evil Commies during the Cold War.   All those trials and tribulations suddenly pale in comparison to the power suddenly going out.  Now what do we do?  Look astonished.  Run in circles.  Duck and Cover?

The old people- troopers that they are- attempt to go through Life As Usual despite the frightening lack of light.  The scene with the woman attempting to hold a flashlight against her neck with her chin just might be my favorite in the history of commercials.  Um, grandma?  The food is right there on the plate, in front of you.  It's not moving.  Once you've got that concept down, I'm not sure why you actually have to have a beam of light glaring into it.  Considering the junk people put into their bodies at mealtimes these days, I'm not sure you want to have a real good look at it anyway.

Sidebar:  the fact that this couple has managed to cook dinner despite the lack of power has created a bit of controversy over on YouTube, stimulating an argument which seems to be between people aware of the existence of gas-powered stoves and a presumably younger crowd which apparently believes that the only appliances capable of heating food are microwaves and Popeil Rotisseries.  I didn't join in- I was too busy being astonished that posters at YouTube are capable of carrying out a conversation which does not include "What is that Song Where Can I get that Song I need that Song" or nonstop cursing.

The utter astonishment and delight the old people experience when they switch on their Old Brooklyn Flashlights---errr, Lanterns---is a lot of fun too.  Wow, look, light emitting from a metal device, with just the turn of a dial! Astonishing!  What will they come up with next- an appliance for toasting bread?  Once again, the 21st century is proven to be a Second Renaissance!

And then we get to see all the Amazing Things we can accomplish with Light---err, Olde Brooklyn Lanterns (the superfluous "e" in "Olde" is worth at least another five bucks added to the price, don't you think?)  You can play board games.  You can carry on conversations and actually see the people you are talking to (people still do this in the age of cell phones?)  Most of all, you can sit on couches and stare appreciatively at the Olde Brooklyn Lantern.

Of course, you can get an additional lantern absolutely free, just Pay Additional Shipping and Handling.  Simply can NOT get through a commercial for one of these SuperAmazing Devices without throwing that in.

I'll let the makers of Olde Brooklyn Lanterns have the final word- one YouTuber asks "what does it run on?"  A friendly spokesperson for Olde Brooklyn Lantern helpfully responds "It operates on 2 D Batteries."  So- it's a flashlight.  A flashlight which goes through batteries much faster than your standard, Not Lantern Type flashlights, since it emits more light (the "100,000 HOURS" claim, I presume, refers to the life of the BULB, not the BATTERIES.  If it doesn't, I expect that the Friendly Spokesperson will be somewhat Less Friendly when she responds to this post.  BTW, anyone here ever have a bulb from a typical flashlight die on you?)

Anyway- thanks, makers of Olde Brooklyn Lantern, for bringing us this delightfully cheesy commercial, and especially for bringing us into the lives of these very funny old folks and their lack-of-electricity issues.  If I had remained in the Washington DC area over the summer, I would have liked to have a good stockpile of these--ummm, "lanterns" to gaze at as I sat in my hot, humid apartment, drowning in my own perspiration, with no electricity for two weeks.  I escaped, but I'm sure that I left behind many potential customers, who may actually get to see your ad, someday, assuming that f----ing Pepco ever gets it's f---ing act together and gets the f---ing power turned back on.

Of course, the real danger lies in drinking this junk

A while back, I snarked on a McDonald's commercial which attempted to explain why that restaurant offered Egg McMuffins, pancakes and coffee.  The ad showed a variety of people attempting to make breakfast at home and failing miserably, and the message was "we make breakfast because you are too intensely stupid to pull it off without doing serious damage to yourself and your house."

I think the makers of International Coffee Creamers (I think that's the sponsor) are using basically the same tactic here.  Apparently you have two choices if you want a cup of fat-laden cream flavored with coffee- you can either risk life and limb buying it at your favorite coffee shop, or you can safely and easily purchase it at the Safeway while picking up your weekly supply of frozen pizza and Doritos. 

And just in case you didn't buy the notion that there is some danger in purchasing your coffee at Starbucks (other than snapping and killing the people in front of you who have amazingly complicated drink orders,) here are some episodes of Let's Laugh at the Stupid People Getting Hurt theater.  I have the strong sense that this is just a bone tossed to the YouTube crowd, which can't get enough of watching Stupid People Getting Hurt no matter what the background situation.

I'm not sure why most of the stuff we see happening to these idiots can't happen in the kitchen after pouring a great big class of cream- maybe it's just that it's less likely to be caught on a cellphone and YouTube'd?  And maybe not even so much less likely- it's not like anyone puts their cellphones away, ever, anymore.

Ok, FIOS! I won't kill myself now!

Here's another "we've just made your life worth living, worship us" ad from FIOS.  And it works because everyone in the commercial is a drooling, electronics-obsessed dweeb whose life revolves around whatever happens to be on their glowing box at that moment.

So we see that, thanks to FIOS, we can all be amazed by faster download speeds.  Never mind that for 99 percent of us, download speeds were already just fine, thank you- no, FIOS knows we were suffering through those 12 second lags before we could watch our most recent Netflix choice, so they've pulled off another "revolution" which will make us more than happy to pay premium prices.

One woman is, for some reason, perched on the ledge of some skyscraper (is she stalking Batman?) when the Holy Grail of Faster Connect Times hits her device.  And here's a kid parked under the sheets on his bed, suddenly realizing that he can watch two or three times more porn on a nightly basis thanks to FIOS (with an assist from his over-indulgent "parents," of course.)

Anyway, all of these idiot choads are just amazed at what Fios Hath Wrought.  My guess is that they are also amazed that anyone ever saw anything revolutionary in what happened on July 4, 1776-- really, internet speeds were RIDICULOUSLY slow back then.  I think they were using Prodigy or something.

Could the Subaru at least burst into flames for no reason during the ride back?

I don't care what kind of car this Subaru is- I don't care what kind of gas mileage it gets, what kind of warranty it comes with, or how much legroom it offers.  I don't care about it's safety rating, nor do I care how many it seats.  And I sure don't care how much it costs.

Nothing can distract me from the ad's central message- women exist to frantically follow scruffy Eurotrash-wannabee hipster doofuses as they tick off the items on their upscale bucket lists.  While begging for help in doing so over 1980s-style walkie-talkies (seriously- here's an opportunity to include a cell phone being used for a practical purpose, and you punt? What is the matter with you, Subaru?)

"Do you know where you are going?" "Wherever the wind takes me."  (Deleted line: "So just keep following me, and keep your mouth shut, Woman Fortunate Enough to be Married to Me.")

"You are so off course."  This gets no reply.  Guy in Balloon is done talking to his ride home.  Her annoyance at his thoughtless asshattery, which basically translates into his leading her through the countryside by the nose, has absolutely no impact on him.  Of course, she's no prize herself-  crunching squirrels and other wildlife as she roars through private property to keep up with the Dick She's Inexplicably Attached To.

Oh, but she gets to throw a quip at the end.  To which he responds with a smirk which for all the world says to me "hey, if you think you've just won something, all the better for me- I'm the one who got to ride in a balloon all fucking day while you followed me around in a Subaru."

"Wherever the wind takes me."  Tell me you didn't want a horrible, fatal balloon mishap at that moment which ended with this scumbag being pried up from a manure-ridden country field by an army of crows bearing spatulas.  Jesus, what a jerk.

Makes the people responsible for McDonalds ads look like geniuses

My first thought upon viewing this commercial:  It's ten seconds too long.  I mean, we get it.  Here are some cool things.  A big fish.  A cute dog.  A pizza.  People shouting "WOOOO!"  Done and done- yet it goes on and on.

My second thought upon viewing this commercial:  It features jackasses who give me a headache, and I just know that there are going to be idiots with I-Phones making LOL Hilarious parodies, proving that they can be just as talented at being morons as the WOOOOO people in this ad.  I have no doubt that they will be 100 percent successful.

My third thought:  Are these guys showing each other their personal dinner menus?  Is that woman going to eat that dog?

And my final thought: Where is a stubborn, half-blind, 90-year old man at the wheel of a tractor trailer truck when you need one?  How about an asteroid?  Flash flood?  Something, Anything to wipe these idiots off the planet, and my tv screen, ASAP?

Miller Lite: I'm still waiting for the "Only Kidding"

I can't be the only person out there who thought that this was a parody ad when first viewed.

Once I realized that Oh My God, Miller Lite has actually stooped to adding an area at the top of the can which can be punched with any sharp object to encourage the more rapid drinking of beer, I tried to focus on what people were using to do the punching.  Did each case come with an official Miller Lite-Approved Sharp Object, Keep out of the Reach of Children?  Nope- these people are using car keys, can openers, oily screwdrivers, rocks, drumsticks, sarcasm- anything sharp- to get that stupid hole punched in so that they can consume their beers and move on to, well, more beer.

I don't actually see all these objects in the ad, but I get the idea, and I can imagine that each and every one of them has already been used to access the flow enhancement properties of Miller Lite.  And considering the quality of people who drink this crap, I expect that we'll soon be learning of injuries involving shards of broken glass, cat claws, pens, pencils (look for "is it safe for me to drink the beer if it's got lead floating in it somewheres?" posts at the Official Miller Lite Website soon) and ricocheting BBs.  Naturally Miller Lite will be producing a line of Designer Hole Punchers (probably featuring the autograph of your "favorite" NASCAR driver) before the summer is up- that is, unless this idea goes the way of Crystal Pepsi and gets laughed off the stage before the leaves begin to fall.

Meanwhile-- hey, Miller Lite?  You should warn people not to try to use their wit to create the holes.  If they are taken in by this stupid ad, it's not anywhere near sharp enough. 

"How you like me now?"*  Same as before.   This is Miller Lite.  Same shit, different can.  Earth to Miller: the problem isn't the can, it's the contents.  I know that's harder to fix, but there it is.

*More than one classic YouTube poster has asked "what's this song?"  I'm not kidding.

Another painfully familiar scene, courtesy of Chase Sapphire

Remember when you bumped into these people at your favorite low-cost hamburger joint?

You were just settling into your booth with your significant other for a burger and french fries and a little lighthearted talk.   You got your menus, you ordered your drinks, you started skimming the entrees.  No fuss, no muss, no problem.

Then they came in.  Two little kids and their dad (or at least, it SEEMED that their dad was there- kind of hard to tell, when you consider the behavior that followed.)  Naturally, they were put into the booth right behind you.  Maybe you didn't know it at that moment, but your plans for a quiet lunch were over the second they sat down.

Because for the next forty minutes, the kids would not stay in their seats for more than five seconds at a time.  Because they continuously leaned into your space, stared at you, and asked you to say "hi" to them.  (Being a civilized human being, you didn't say what you wanted to say, but instead replied "hi" to this total stranger you had no interest in talking to.  What you wanted to say was "get the fuck out of my face, where the hell is your father?")  Because they would not stop kicking the back of your seat.

And then the food came.  They threw french fries at each other, blew into their straws and splashed milkshake all over their table, fought over the ketchup and used every napkin at their table to make hats, parachutes- everything but for wiping their greasy faces.   You couldn't get your iced tea refilled, because your waitress was at their table pretty much every minute, waiting for them to decide what kind of ice cream they wanted, then replacing each kid's dessert twice because A) it wasn't Exactly What They Wanted, and B) It Spilled, Sorry.  

And all the time, "Dad" just sat there with a dumb look on his face, like he was so pleased that his asshole kids were bothering other people and not just him for a change- or more, likely, he was completely oblivious to the concept that maybe there were people in the restaurant other than himself and his worthless spawn.   I've had plenty of experience with "parents" who just assume that everyone finds their kids as delightful as they do- or think that if they have to put up with the little nasties 24/7, that's pain that should be shared on occasion, and if we are annoyed, we should seriously just fuck off.

Anyway,  Dickweed Dad, finally realizing that he had milked the whole Share My Family With The World thing for as long as he could, whipped out his Chase Sapphire card and handed it to the ever-present, and by now completely exhausted, waitress.  When he walked out of the place with his idiot kids, he left behind plenty of evidence that they had enjoyed themselves immensely- a mountain of napkins under the table, several puddles of milkshake on it, about a hundred globs of ketchup everywhere....

Oh, and a five percent tip.  These people are NEVER generous with their tipping- my guess is that they think the Joy Their Kids Bring is more than enough.  All of this putting the waitress in just the right mood to give you and your date a little attention, now that you are about ready to leave. 

Hey, Dad?  Maybe next time, you could just order a fricking pizza?  I know that means we are deprived of your wonderful boys, and you'll have to clean up your own god damned mess, but we'd like to have a nice dinner out sometime too, you know.

Oh, what am I thinking?  People like you don't give a flying crap about anything but your own convenience.  Sorry if I confused you.